The Love Series Complete Box Set (167 page)

He pulled me closer to him, kissed the top of my head, and smiled down at me. “Uh, yeah it did.”

“Good, then you’ll let me do it again?” I joked as we relaxed against one another.

“Only if you let me do it to you, too,” he whispered against my temple.

We sat in the quiet stillness for a while longer, listening to nothing but the sounds of the night and our quiet breathing. His words startled me, roused me out of my sleepy state.

“I’m sorry I screwed everything up. I let my grades slip for the last year, and then we lost states and my stats took a nosedive.” It took me a minute to realize what the hell he was even talking about.

Scranton.

I sat up, turned toward him, and gripped both of his hands in mine. “Listen to me, Shane. You didn’t screw up anything. We’ll figure it out.” I just didn’t know how.

Chapter Eight

October 4, 2007

Studying in the back corner of the poorly lit library of Sullivan County Community College was not exactly where I wanted to be. No, where I wanted to be was at Scranton, with Dylan. Even though he was only about an hour-and-a-half drive from me, it felt like he was a world away.

I missed him so much; it physically hurt. I tried to tell myself I only had to deal with being away from him for a year. Just one year. The main focus of the year was to get my grades back up and save up enough money to get out of here. To move away from my family and be done with this place.

But no matter how many times I told myself those things, I still felt like I couldn’t keep my head above water. Being with Dylan was the only thing that made me feel whole, complete—he made me feel alive.

Without him, the depression I had felt through most of my senior year came back in full force, making it nearly impossible to get out of bed some mornings. Of course, my father mistook this for me being a “lazy, unmotivated piece-of-shit”—an accusation that I no longer cared to defend.

To be honest, I felt worthless. Reid was enjoying his junior year of high school, living up his football season with endless parties and girls. I think he enjoyed being out of my shadow in that small school, even though he would never admit it. So rather than bringing him down, I lied to him constantly, that I had made friends, that I was enjoying college. I wanted him to believe me more than anything, because if he didn’t, if he prodded and asked me questions, if he tried to kick me out of this funk, I knew I’d break down.

I just had to focus, but at eight o’clock on a Thursday night in a dreary library with a textbook staring me down, focus was the last thing I had going for me.

Lost in thought about him, I pulled out my phone and tried to call Dylan. No one was around me and the librarian, who looked like she might keel over and die if someone made a moderately loud noise, was busy behind the front desk, typing away on the ancient computer.

His phone rang four or five times before the voicemail picked up. Sadly, even hearing his greeting made me feel a little better, not much, but a little, nonetheless. I left him a message, telling him I missed him and that I was looking forward to visiting him in a few weeks.

Just as I was sliding my phone back into my pocket, a strong hand clamped down on my shoulder, scaring the shit out of me. I turned in my seat, and saw Scott Henderson, from baseball camp, standing behind me. “Hey, Scott.” I stood and shook his hand.

“Shane. I thought that was you. I think we’re in the same sociology class.” His words were friendly, but I would always remember him for how he spoke about Dylan, at first, questioning his sexuality with an unmistakable disdain.

“Yeah, I think so.” He pulled up a seat next to me, and turned it backward before sitting in it. I returned to my seat and began packing my things up. I felt uneasy, whether it was because I was feeling lonely, or because Scott put me on edge, I just knew I wanted to get out of there.

“I thought you said you were heading off to Scranton with a scholarship and everything,” Scott asked, folding his arms on the back of the chair.

Shrugging, I answered lamely. “I did, but I lost it. Just need to get my shit together for a year before I can hope to transfer. What about you? I thought you had bigger plans than this place.”

He laughed. “Yeah, I did. But my parents got divorced a few months after that camp. The scholarship I had didn’t cover everything and my mom couldn’t afford it. The few bucks my dad was willing to throw in weren’t much of a help, so I chose to go here. Stay close to home and help Mom out. Plus, my sister is in college, too, and she’s almost done, so I didn’t want to screw up her last year.”

Maybe my first impressions of Scott were wrong. Maybe he wasn’t a jerk, after all. He had a level head on his shoulders and he cared about his family. Some of the tension I thought I would feel talking to him faded as we joked about our older-than-dirt sociology professor.

After sitting there for about twenty minutes, I slung my bag over my shoulder and got ready to go. If I was lucky enough, maybe I could catch Dylan before I went to bed.

“All right, man, it was good catching up. I’ll see you in class, yeah?” Scott stood next to me. He’d filled out since camp. He was about as tall as me at about six foot, but a bit more muscled—almost too much, for my own taste.

My own taste.
That thought had me smirking. I was able to admit my desires in my own head. I couldn’t wait for the day that I could verbalize them to someone other than Dylan.

“There’s a party tomorrow night at my sister’s sorority house. Wanna join?” he offered as I adjusted my bag. As much as I didn’t want to be around him earlier, he had really never been anything but nice to me in our time at the camp. Hell, he and Eric actually let me stay with them for a few nights after I found out about Dylan. Of course, I’d just told them Dylan was being an asshole and that I couldn’t stay there with him.

A pang of guilt hit me right in the gut. I had been such an asshole to Dylan. I only hoped he knew how much I regretted shutting him out for so long.

While a sorority house party was the last thing on my sounds-like-a-great-idea list, it sure as hell sounded better than sitting in my room alone all night while my parents fought downstairs and while Reid was out with his friends.

On a whim, I said, “Sure. Sounds like fun.” We exchanged numbers and said we’d be in touch the next day. Even though I didn’t feel entirely happy, the thought of at least having
something
to do made me smile as I walked to my car and drove home.

Despite my best arguments to drive myself, Scott insisted on picking me up. He knew the best place to park because it was his sister’s house. Since I didn’t feel like having to answer about a few dents and scratches on my car to my dad, I went along with it.

When we pulled up to the house, I could practically feel the music pulsing out the front door. It was a weird night—warm and humid, the usual chilly fall air was nowhere to be found. But really, it was more than the weather that was strange. I felt out of place, even though the drive had been relaxed and easy.

Inside, all I saw was people and red plastic cups. It was pretty much the same as any high school party I’d been to, except here, I knew no one. Scott handed me a drink and I willingly swallowed back half of it in one huge gulp. A little liquid courage and I’d be fine.

“Come on. I’ll introduce you to my sister and her friends.” He still had to yell even though he leaned in close to my ear.

Scott led me out back onto the deck. The railing was covered in multi-colored Christmas lights and blow-up palm trees graced every corner. It was tacky and cheesy and one-hundred percent what I’d expect a college house to look like. The volume was much more tolerable out back and I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw a line of people failing miserably at a drunken limbo contest.

A few of his friends greeted me, but we eventually meandered our way out to the small backyard where Scott’s sister, Alex, was sitting around a fire-pit with a group of her friends.

She leapt out of her seat and squealed when she saw Scott. “You made it!”

“Free drinks and a night out of the house, fuck yeah, I made it,” he joked as he draped an arm over her shoulder. She was much shorter than him. Since she only came up to Scott’s chest as she stood next to him, she was safely past five-feet tall. Pretty much everything about her was petite. She was cute—like a little pixie. Her short black hair framed her face and made her light blue eyes pop.

A group of kids who Scott apparently knew already came up behind him, taking his attention away from his sister, leaving me to introduce myself.

“So, hi. I’m Shane.” I extended my hand to her and she smiled coyly at me before sliding her small hand into mine.

“Alex.” She winked and released my hand. “You’ll have to excuse my brother. Everything else ceases to exist when he’s around beer and boobs.” Her gaze fell over my shoulder to where Scott had just been dragged. He was apparently needed as another judge in the wet T-shirt contest.

Thank God, he hadn’t dragged me with him.

“Need another drink?” Alex tipped her head to the keg off to the side of the house. “We leave that one in the shadows so we don’t have to wait on line inside.”

“Sure.” I finished off the rest of my first drink as she pulled me over to the keg. “So how come you’re sitting out here. Isn’t this your house?” I asked as I filled our cups.

“Yeah, but I had a late study session tonight. I’d rather just chill by the fire.”

“What are you studying?” I hadn’t declared a major, yet. There was no point, really. Since I was only going to be there until May, I could figure out the rest of my life later. But I still knew the rules. Meet another college student, ask them what they’re studying. It was a rule encoded in a college student’s DNA; I was sure.

“I’m actually going to be a nurse. I finish my undergrad program in December and then I’m off to grad school in the spring.” She was obviously proud of her career choice; her enthusiasm bled through each and every one of her words.

As we got our drinks, the group of her friends made their way over to the ridiculously outrageous wet T-shirt contest. I couldn’t help but stare—not for the boobs, obviously. I was simply transfixed, watching a group of people laugh and have a good time. It had been so long since I’d been around that kind of scene, that I’d kind of missed it.

And of course, it was just my luck that Alex mistook my distraction as a guy staring at tits than for what it actually was.

Her fingers snapping in my face roused me out of my silent staring. “Did you hear
any
of what I just said?” Her tone was more joking than angry which helped me relax back into the conversation.

“Sorry. Yeah, I heard parts of it,” I answered honestly. “Sorry to hear about your parents.”

She rolled her shoulders and took a large swig of her drink. “Thanks, but it’s better that he’s gone. Even though I wasn’t home much, it was a shitty place to live. They were always fighting and screaming. My mom was miserable, so now maybe she can be a little happier.” She took another sip. “You probably don’t want to hear it, though. Not the most lighthearted of conversations for a party, huh?” She scoffed, at herself more than what she thought I was interested in.

“My parents are the same.” The look on her face suggested my confession shocked her a little. “They aren’t divorced, but they should be.” I leaned back in the Adirondack chair, stretching my legs out in front of me, letting the dancing and flickering flames relax me. “What did you wish for on your tenth birthday?”

She choked on her beer, obviously surprised my question. “I’m sorry, what?” she laughed.

I leaned forward, resting my elbows on my knees. “No, seriously, what did you wish for?”

Alex pulled her legs up on the chair and hugged them close to her chest. “Okay, then. Let’s see.” She absentmindedly played with a piece of her hair as she thought. “I was big into horse riding back then, so probably something to do with that. Or Nurse Barbie. I pretty much wished for that every year.” She paused, letting herself get lost in the memory for a brief moment, before asking, “You?”